Cooper Arms followup

Here's the image of a $2100 Obama contribution by a Daniel Cooper of Pound Ridge, NY, no occupation given. The FEC webpage lists this under Daniel Cooper/Copper Firearms, I believe by mistake.

Here's an image of a 2/6/08 donation of $1,000 by Dan Cooper of Akron OK, President/CEO of Cooper Firearms. (For some strange reason the report says his cumulative donations are $3100 -- maybe the Obama Campaign got him confused with the NY Cooper, since this would be the total of the above two).

Here's the image of a 2/6/08 $800 contribution by Dan Cooper of Akron OH, President/CEO of Cooper Firearms of Montana. Cumulative donations given as $3200, which matches nothing.

Here's the image of the $800 refund made the same day to him. Cumulative donations now become $3100 again.

All quite confusing. It looks as if his donations were under the limit, and the Obama Campaign didn't have to send the refund. My theory: the Obama Campaign (whose reports these are) got him confused with the NY Cooper, and somehow thought he'd reached his limit ($3200), and thus sent him the refund. The FEC made the same mistake. And OpenSecrets all the other secondary sources picked up the FEC mistake and are reporting that.

If you do a search for him on the FEC webpage, you'll see what I mean. His address for some reason is given as Montana, even tho every image of paperwork gives his address as in Ohio. It confutes him with the New York Cooper, and even gets amounts wrong, $900 instead of $800.

The above was just trying to settle a mystery. The core question is why did the owner of a firearms company donate to an anti-gun candidate, then lamely claim it was only intended to defeat Hillary, when what stirred everything up was his endorsing Obama quite recently in a news story.

I think the company still has some explaining to do with its statement that he gave to McCain (which he may have, if record keeping is so poor) and that he just wanted to defeat Hillary (patently false since he gave to Obama in 04).

I just checked Cooper Firearms web site and it is locked down except for a home page announcement stating that the board of directors asked for and received Dan Cooper's resignation. It was followed by a lengthy disclaimer that they don't agree with Cooper but he has his 1st ammendment right to free speech.

I sent them an email earlier today. Just a little while ago, I received their reply:

"In response to the recent article highlighting Dan Cooper’s personal political donations, the board of directors, shareholders and employees of Cooper Firearms of Montana, Inc would like to issue the following statement.

The employees, shareholders and board of directors of Cooper Firearms of Montana do not share the personal political views of Dan Cooper.

Although we all believe everyone has a right to vote and donate as they see fit, it has become apparent that the fallout may affect more than just Mr. Cooper. It may also affect the employees and the shareholders of Cooper Firearms.

The board of directors has asked Mr. Cooper to resign as President of Cooper Firearms of Montana, Inc.

Daily operations will continue with the competent staff currently in place in Stevensville, MT producing the finest, most accurate rifles money can buy.

Dan Cooper has spent all of his working life producing the highest quality rifles built here in the USA. He started with nothing but the American Dream and built that into firearms company anyone would be proud of. We firmly believe Dan stands by the 2nd amendment.
We wish him all of the best in his future pursuits."

As I commented on your other post, under normal circumstances I don't think that a man should get hounded out his job because of his political views. However, in Cooper's case, if there is a board of directors, then it is probably a publicly traded corporation. If it is such, then as a "C" level employee, Cooper's continued presence at the company can devalue shares and rock investor confidence in the corporation. The directors have no real choice but to ask for his resignation.

T Gething: Actually, it states nothing about their receiving his resignation, although the artful wording certainly implies that.

And there's other problems with it as well, e.g. I for one don't believe that "Dan stands by the 2nd amendment", and if they "firmly believe" that they're delusional. This statement doesn't look much more honest than the last one.

If he and his allies hold a majority of the stock, the board is not in a position to enforce their request; I'm not sure what proof I'd need that he's really separated from the company...

Why does everyone act as if McCain is somehow a safer choice for gun owners? His recent metamorphosis from the McCain of 8 or 4 years ago to the McCain of today shows that the man will do anything the polls tell him to. If a majority of the public wanted to ban all handguns, he'd jump at it as fast as Obama would.

McCain is pro whatever suits him at the moment and if he thought going anti-gun would win him this election, he'd do it in a heartbeat.

IF all Cooper had done was donate to the Obama campaign during the primaries with the hope of defeating Mrs. Clinton, I could see it. As embarassed as I am to admit it, I honestly did just that. At the time, my fear was Mrs. Clinton, and truth to tell, Obama did not look as if he could win in the general election.

You'll recall that even Rush Limbaugh was urging folks to support Obama in order to defeat Mrs. Clinton. So many of us have goofed to get us to this insane turn of events.

Rush told people to vote for Obambi not "support" him there is a gigantic difference, I would have gladly voted for the big eared idiot to eff with the democrat nomination process, had Rush made the call earlier.

You give money to the enemy of gun owners, you are the enemy, end of discussion.

1. Flemm - the issue is Dan Cooper's contributions to Obama, who is manifestly the most anti-gun candidate of a major party for President in our history. To do such a thing and claim to be pro-gun is a simple, bald-faced lie.

2. Even if Cooper resigned every office and his employment, he's likely the majority stockholder (or maybe it is his wife or kids - no difference to me). First, he'll still earn most or all of the profits. Second, once the world forgets this, he'll be back in every capacity that he was before. Not that I was in the market for a multi-thousand dollar rifle, but if I was I wouldn't buy it from that company (or any other one associated with him).

Sorry, Dan, but you really, really screwed the pooch on this one. You may be a world-class builder of accurate rifles, but you should've had the sense to stay away from the gun-grabbers. Now you will pay the price.

Why can one not give money to Obama and be pro-gun? That's a ridiculous thing to say.

Both candidates are running on many different issues, some of which this man may value more than a their views on firearms. Especially since unless public opinion calls for it, there will most likely be no new firearm legislation.

You should worry less about if one man dislikes firearms and more about the fact that a growing number of citizens dislike them. If every American wanted to have their 2nd Amendment rights restored, they would be. Blaming authority for the average citizen's apathy is a cop out.

A company cannot act contrary to its customers interests and not suffer for it when the customers find out. And gun owners are one of the most plugged-in constituencies. The NRA gets the word out fast when someone is anti-gun.

Maybe Danno thought that he was being clever, that bolt-action rifles would be the last type of gun to get banned. This might have been a strategic move to increase his sales in the future. LOL

Flemm:Why can one not give money to Obama and be pro-gun? That's a ridiculous thing to say.

It's not so ridiculous when you consider Obama's prior record. He has been in favor of:

1. Outlaw hunting ammunition;
2. Outlaw ALL semiautomatics;
3. Ban guns stores within 5 miles of schools - which would close 90% of gun stores in the United States;
4. Ban handguns (at least in major cities).

In addition, he was on the board of the Joyce Foundation, the chief source of funding for anti-gun groups like the Brady Campaign (or whatever they call themselves nowadays).

In short, Obama is as anti-gun as they come.

Now, maybe to some folks, the gun control issue isn't that important. I can understand that.

But it's just insane that a guy who manufactures and sells rifles for a living to support Obama. It goes against his own self-interest. You have to wonder what the hell he's thinking.

Two things, if An American is an American I am a sun god. He may have been born here but he is no American. And I suspect he be the racist, since he injected it into the conversation and the topic before us has absolutely nothing to do with race. Only a racist could conjure that lame ass accusation out of thin air.

Second thing:

"Lets see do you support the anointed one on....

His stance on abortion, he supports it in all forms."

No kidding! He even supports retroactive abortion. If the baby doesn't die, hide it in a closet and let it die from dehydration and starvation. It's on the record.